Thursday, December 4, 2014

Since I wrote in October about a new scheme for early mesh-based TempLS reporting, I've been looking forward to producing such an early result. Last month didn't work, because GHCN was late. But this month everything is on time. For me, there is added interest, because I developed the daily NCEP/NCAR based index, and it has been suggesting a perhaps unexpected drop in November temperature.

The early TempLS mesh report is now out, and it does show a corresponding drop, from 0.647°C (Oct) to 0.557°C (Nov, base 1961-1990). The Oct value also came back a little, which reduced the difference slightly.

It is indeed a very early report, and will change. 3108 stations, probably about 70% of final. There is essentially no data from Canada, China, Australia, and most of S America and Africa. So it's too early to have much faith in the regional map, but the cold in the US certainly showed up.

Both satellite indices showed small reductions, with RSS going from 0.274°C to 0.246°C, and UAH similar. In terms of a record warm 2014, I think the likelihood is essentially unchanged.

Update 8/12 With most GHCN data now in, TempLS has risen a bit, to 0.579°C. But the NCEP/NCAR measure went the other way. It stayed cold in November, with the average down to 0.106°C, and December (to 4th) has been cold too.

I just doubled checked: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata_v3/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt(Sum(2010)-Sum(2014))/100=0.55

NOAA will be released on Monday and I don't know if it fudges data like NASA does but as of October its numbers require only +0.98 for November+December. Take it to the bank that it absolutely will happen.

Anyway, in the press NOAA appears to be the series used to determine warmest year

Then we've got a record already! November from NOAA was released today, also +0.65C. With their new much cooler 2010, the only way 2014 won't be at record high is if the anomaly in December will be negative in relation to the 20th century average. Needless to say, this is practically impossible.

I find it easier and more intuitive to do this fool-proof calculation: Calculate total annual anomaly (add up all monthly numbers): 2005 - 7.80, 2010 - 7.89, 2014 - 7.43. But there will be one more month in 2014, so the minimum anomaly in 2014 required for an absolute record is (7.89-7.34)+0.01=0.56. How likely is 0.56? I say VERY likely!

1. Mean December value for years 1998-2013 is not that far, 0.512. You yourself mentioned "El Nino Lite" - perhaps that is why 2a. http://cci-reanalyzer.org/DailySummary/ so far paints a picture of pretty warm December and forecasts more warmth in a coming week.2b. Nick's NCEP treatment suggest that December might very well end up being warmer than November: http://www.moyhu.blogspot.com.au/p/latest-ice-and-temperature-data.html#NCAR2c. Visual inspection of daily satellite maps also suggests that December 2014 so far is warmer than December 2013. 3. Even if 2b and 2c above won't hold by the end of the year, there is still a sizable margin before a record is not set (0.09 in the case of 2b or 0.04 in the case of 2c).

So, all in all, I'd bet heavily that GISS will set up the record (with their latest adjusted numbers - colder 2010 and warmer 2014).

I find it easier and more intuitive to do this fool-proof calculation: Calculate total annual anomaly (add up all monthly numbers): 2005 - 7.80, 2010 - 7.89, 2014 - 7.43. But there will be one more month in 2014, so the minimum anomaly in 2014 required for an absolute record is (7.89-7.34)+0.01=0.56. How likely is 0.56? I say VERY likely!

1. Mean December value for years 1998-2013 is not that far, 0.512. You yourself mentioned "El Nino Lite" - perhaps that is why 2a. http://cci-reanalyzer.org/DailySummary/ so far paints a picture of pretty warm December and forecasts more warmth in a coming week.2b. Nick's NCEP treatment suggests that December might very well end up being warmer than November: http://www.moyhu.blogspot.com.au/p/latest-ice-and-temperature-data.html#NCAR2c. Visual inspection of daily satellite maps also suggests that December 2014 so far is warmer than December 2013. 3. Even if 2b and 2c above won't hold by the end of the year, there is still a sizable margin before a record is not set (0.09 in the case of 2b or 0.04 in the case of 2c).

So, all in all, I'd bet heavily that GISS will set the record (with their latest adjusted numbers - colder 2010 and warmer 2014).

P.S. I find that my comments here are randomly deleted - I see them posted but within a minute or two they disappear. I am pretty sure that I don't have anything uncivil in those deleted posts. This is a second attempt.

DK, Sorry about the comments problem. It's not anything I did, but they did go through to spam. I've released them, to reassure Blogger. You can delete them if you like - there is an option to make them disappear completely. I'll keep watch - it's a long time since Blogger has made that error.

Thanks for the tip about NOAA. You may have seen my new post on that. I'm being cautious about GISS, but I think the chances are still pretty fair. NCEP/NCAR seems to dip rather easily.

I refer to the two halves of ENSO neutral - negative ONI and positive ONI - as either La Nina lite or El Nino lite because I think you can often detect their presence almost instantly in the SAT. The AMO cooled this month and I expect the PDO will do the same, so my guess is the ENSO region has to warm to offset that for GISS to make the mark. And it appears to be doing that. To me this is a very interesting year to watch this unfold.

Between November and September 2014 datasets, a total annual anomaly was corrected for 15 years since 1998: for 12 to slightly less and for 3 slightly up: 1998 -0.021999 -0.022000 -0.022001 -0.022002 -0.042003 -0.022004 0.002005 -0.022006 -0.012007 -0.012008 0.022009 0.032010 -0.012011 0.012012 -0.012013 -0.01